A
review commissioned by the World Health Organisation (WHO) and carried
out by Imperial College London researchers concludes that eLearning is
likely to be as effective as traditional methods for training health
professionals.

eLearning,
the use of electronic media and devices in education, is already used
by some universities to support traditional campus-based teaching or
enable distance learning.

Wider
use of eLearning might help to address the need to train more health
workers across the globe. According to a recent WHO report, the world is
short of 7.2 million healthcare professionals, and the figure is
growing.

The
Imperial team, led by Dr Josip Car, carried out a systematic review of
the scientific literature to evaluate the effectiveness of eLearning for
undergraduate health professional education.

They
conducted separate analyses looking at online learning, requiring an
internet connection, and offline learning, delivered using CD-ROMs or
USB sticks, for example.

The
findings, drawn from a total of 108 studies, showed that students
acquire knowledge and skills through online and offline eLearning as
well as or better than they do through traditional teaching.

The
authors suggest that combining eLearning with traditional teaching
might be more suitable for healthcare training than courses that rely
fully on eLearning because of the need to acquire practical skills.

Dr
Josip Car, from the School of Public Health at Imperial College London
said: “eLearning programmes could potentially help address the shortage
of healthcare workers by enabling greater access to education,
especially in the developing world the need for more health
professionals is greatest.

“There
are still barriers that need to be overcome, such as access to
computers, internet connections, and learning resources, and this could
be helped by facilitating investments in ICT. Universities should
encourage the development of eLearning curricula and use online
resources to reach out to students internationally.”